LCDRChipShanle

I think actually the opposite.

It was actually pretty cool.

(The 727 was purchased for $449,000 and put a couple more hundred thousand in maintenance and mods. We pulled it out of storage in Ardmore, OK.)

Correct. The flight engineer and first officer went out on downwind after the practice run. The captain flew it by himself to the descent point where I took it over after running through the checklist. At 4000 ft he left the cockpit, at 2500 ft the jump master and the captain jumped.

They are virtually the same aircraft. They have the same fuselage and cockpit, so the data we gather is directly transferable. The main reason, was because of the rear exit (the "DB Cooper" door. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Db_cooper)

I was in the chase aircraft, so I heard nothing. Obviously in the aircraft, you would hear ripping of metal and the sound of impact - and surprisingly, two jet engines running on a high power setting, they continued to run on impact.